Much of my work is in bridging yoga, or what yoga is at its core, with fitness and coaching clients. Ultimately, Yoga is about paying attention. Do you pay attention to what you’re doing when you dance? Then, how much do you notice? Do you notice the subtle differences from hip to hip, from twisting left to twisting right? Do you notice elation and frustration, sensation, pain, and lightness?

Yoga is not about the asana. To paraphrase David Nelson of Yoga Garden San Francisco: asana is one part of hatha yoga, which is but one part of a full and integral system of yoga. Do not try to categorize yoga.

And please, do not try to turn off your mind.

Turning off the mind, as an act, simply does not work all that well. Instead, consider your experience of those moments of awe and beauty when someone you love catches your eye. That’s yoga. Feeling. Connecting. Yoga on the mat is a small, small part of the bigger practice of paying attention and loving all of life. For many, it is the gateway into an experiential understanding of connectedness. A yogic practice, or process, can start by being service-oriented, people-oriented, or body-oriented as in a modern yoga class or a class based on Yogic Conditioning or Yogic Warrior Conditioning.  (see www.epicworkout.com).

Regarding your physical practice, consider this: I help people stop trying to fit their minds and bodies into classes and fitness routines, and rather, to take ownership of your body, your practice (and in many ways, your life) by starting with you, your intentions and attentions, and design your program from the inside out. What that depends on, depends on you.

Every athlete wants to be faster, stronger, more powerful, and more injury prone. This is especially true for triathletes who swim, bike and run great distances. You demand speed, require strength, and need to save time. Tools and methods that increase your foundation of strength and speed are extremely valuable, and every edge counts.

This article reviews the benefits of using kettlebells from the perspective of Yogic Warrior Conditioning and is designed to give the triathlete the possibility of greater outcomes in exchange for your valuable energy and time spent training.

On Kettlebells:
Buy the hype, just don’t believe it. (in other words, get your kettlebell but own your movement).

Kettlebells are simply stimulators and enhancers of multi-functional training of natural human movement.

You already have all the weight you need to create phenomenal strength and power for your purposes and your life. Kettlebells add a level of challenge, skill and learning that support many specific sports, yet the basics are the same. The basic skills of running, jumping, leaping, pushing and pulling are what take you across pavement and through water.

You already know how to build your endurance and train your psyche to succeed for the race. The advantage you are missing is the buildup of your fundamental baselines. This is the level where kettlebells add a concrete and immediate benefit: build your baselines of strength, power and mindfulness and your race time will decrease as you enjoy it even more!

The three skills that most directly transfer to your triathlaon success.

1. 1 and 2-Arm Swings
2. Swing/Hi-pull/Gunsling
3. Snatch or Rack & Push-Press

Thus, DO

• Improve your baseline foundations through appropriate intensity.
• your training needs by balancing the lowest volume required and greatest intensity possible.
• just less (than you think you can), and you’ll progress faster.

And DON’T

• Ignore your breath. It’s your greatest coach, so follow it and heed its lessons.
• Focus on learning too many skills. Push intensity and mastery in core skills and build your baselines.
• Do endless sets and reps. With functional work, build capacity through intensity. Then go practice your race skills.

This article in a sentence:

Follow your breath and maintain awareness as you practice your maximum intensity and effort.

A Few Words on Fitness

With Epic and Yogic Warrior Conditioning, you take exercise vertical with depth and meaning, inquiry and transformation. Yet the fitness world is also changing horizontally, meaning that the techniques, methods and processes are being rearranged, improved, and evolved. Despite the idea that there new rules, I suggest instead that we are returning to the essence of our lives with new distinctions. Where are we going? What needs to be included in today’s fitness program, exercise plan, or yoga practice?

Mobility and Movement Preparation: There are techniques and methods that dramatically surpass ’stretching’ to optimally prepare your body for the movement you choose to train. Flip your mind and Tune In / Tune Up before your training, yoga asana and even meditation.

Corrective Exercise: Injuries of all shapes and size come as a consequence of our lifestyles and training patterns. More of the same is rarely the path out of pain, while noticing your experience often is. You can make the body resilient through intentional, purposeful movement that has the power to improve the way your body works at a deeper level.

Speed, power and elasticity: Remember that power has to do with time, and is not the same is strength. Consider power and strength with speed. Power is lost faster than strength, as easily demonstrated by a long-time yogi returning to a high-impact kickboxing class. Yet for all populations, there is the need for the ability to move and react quickly, and power is critical for getting through life effortlessly.

Core Training: Ab crunches are definitely out, and functional core work is in as we focus on training a body to respond and be active in the world. Whether the lessons come from athletics, martial arts, somatics or yoga, the truth about core is the same.

Resistance Training: A foundational aspect of every practice, we need to focus on function, linked system strength and real world strength. Isolated strength is an illusion, and the key is to practice with appropriate frequency. Strength is about full body connection and coordination towards a purpose. Strength comes from within, and should be trained with the end in mind.

Metabolic Training: Evolutionary cardio - Intensity vs volume is the name of the game, so the the ability to do higher levels of work and maintain output over time will take you where you want to go. Riding the edge of effort and ease will get you there faster.

Recovery & Regeneration: No matter your training modality or the features of your practice, recovery and nourishment - physical and emotional - is a must. This can be done at the gym, on the mat, or at home, and should not be ignored.

Thanks to Alwyn Cosgrove, who framed these concepts, then adapted by Epic Workout for a yogic perspective on exercise and transformation.

The International Health, Racquet & Sportsclub Association (IHRSA) conference recently debuted in San Francisco, where I now reside, and revealed countless new fitness innovations to fitness professionals from all over the world. As the fitness and exercise world evolves, it is increasingly popular and critical to include expanded conceptions of wellness, holistic thinking, and mind-body programs. While this is needed and necessary for all types of teachers and trainers, I want to suggest that for the most part, this evolution is happening horizontally.

By horizontal, I refer to the span and variation of techniques and modalities. Vertical, in contrast, means depth or meaning. Every technique is expressed at some level of depth, and every vertical idea has to be expressed through some form. The changes happening in the fitness industry seem to be more horizontal (sell more technological solutions to basic health challenges) than vertical (make exercise more meaningful). Exercise programming is entirely horizontal and considers muscles, bones, neurons and energy systems. Your trainer shuffles around different techniques to change your body, for example. Mind-body programming is actually vertical and considers meaning, psychology, self and love. Your teacher uses poses or movement to get you to go inside you.

To make this more specific, fitness clubs and trainers are embracing yoga and other mind-body programs, but mostly just the surface features. Do this pose, take this breath, focus on this body area. While taking up conscious movement is a welcome change, it seems sometimes that these methods are used for their appeal rather than the results they deliver. This is viewed as a problem, for some. I argue it is ultimately not a problem. Though the depth work comes from the level of engagement and inquiry and awareness needed for transformation, some does slip in at other times. My own research suggests in a new way that yoga (and all body-mind) works, and that the real body-mind ‘connection’ can affect change. In other words, even if a mind-body or conscious practice is engaged in for entirely superficial reason (watch the judgment!), deep change can occur.

In the final analysis as a teacher, trainer, mover and shaker, I say this: do what calls to you and what fills you up. Do it with all your heart, all your passion, and all your commitment. Now go move, learn, heal, and transform!

The Sports Club/LA San Francisco has a magnificent new rack of kettlebells ranging from 10lbs to 80lbs. Kettlebells are without a doubt one of the single most versatile tools we can use use both for the diversity of techniques you can practice as well as the variety of qualities it can be used to develop. Another dimension is offered when you practice like a yogi. I offer you three tips for creating kettelbell-focused movements that are mindful and meaningful.

1. Set and know your intention each pre-kettelbell moment by asking a question - what is going to get me through this round? Then commit and take action.
2. Find your steady rhythm and find your breath. Increase speed until your breath starts to run away from you. Then play the edge.
3. Focus on the transition at the moment your round or exercise is complete. Hardly anyone pays attention to  the transition out of an exercise and into recovery, yet this is the very moment not to be missed. This moment offers you the opportunity to uncover the meaning behind the drill.

Yogic Warrior Conditioning® is category of conscious movement or mind-body/body-mind practices that starts with you. Flipping a class experience on its head, you are the center and your health, fitness, meditation, movement goals are the tools we use. It’s about power and strength both internally and externally. It’s about making exercise more than exercise, and taking yoga off the mat.

Yogic Warrior Conditioning® is a comprehensive health and fitness system combining Yoga, Functional Training, Conditioning and Restorative Techniques in a way that creates usable strength, develops effortless movement, and deepens awareness of body, mind and spirit.

It’s mindful approach to natural movement and strong focus on awareness and creativity transform our tissues and nervous system to create a balance between improved health & fitness, reduced stress, and enhanced coordination & clarity.

Yogic Warrior Conditioning® makes exercise more than exercise, and helps launch one’s yoga practice off the mat.

Fitness has many levels. Do we address them all with each training session? With our entire movement practice? The mainstream fitness industry address many sides of fitness, and at Epic, we’re interested in going even deeper. Let’s briefly look at the Four Faces, or Perspectives, of physical fitness.

First Face of Fitness

We are motivated by feelings, emotions, self image and enthusiasm. Any physical activity we practice serves to bring you enjoyment, emotions, and experiences ranging from brutal or challenging to refreshing and wonderful. Relative to this perspective, why do you exercise?

Second Face of Fitness

We are motivated by the science and story of how our body’s biology, chemistry, function, strength, power, and capacity. We think about muscles, fat, weight, range of motion, and other external factors. Relative to this perspective, why do you exercise?

Third Face of Fitness

We are motivated by the interplay between the body’s systems, or the relationships between, for example, two fighters, members of a team, teams in competition, and so on. The rules of the game, the systems we follow, the protocols we experiment with and results we achieve are all very important. Relative to this perspective, why do you exercise?

Fourth Face of Fitness

We are motivated by the commaraderie of teamwork, the thrill of competition, the shared community of a yoga class. How the relationships feel and the meaning they provide are crucial to us.Relative to this perspective, why do you exercise?

Now that you’ve looked into the faces of fitness and gained a new understanding that there is more to exercise than exercise, what will you do next?

The Epic Workout has One Goal

To transform our notion of exercise towards wholeness, with awareness, for purpose. With a fresh mindset, deep motivation and lots of intent, we can channel our energies towards doing what we love in ways that fulfill us. In terms of exercise and training, we can wake up in the morning looking forward to our workout. We can relish the challenge, accept the nervousness, swallow our fears and get going strong.

The Epic Workout focuses on Strength, Movement and Awareness. We build strength by overcoming challenges. When we face the adventure, step forward into challenge and overcome, we develop our strength of body and character.

We develop movement when we practice moving in new ways, whether that be dance, yoga, athletics, martial arts or innovative movement patterns. With new capacity and ability defined by skills, flexibility, conditioning and creativity, we can take on more of life’s challenges with greater ease.

We cultivate awareness when we shift attention to our experience. Yogis do this with breath and sensation, and in the Epic Workout it is similar, but breath and sensation are on a different level. We learn to own our bodies and minds by better listening to their communications. We play the game of life together, and thus, transform.

About Epic Movement

Three principles make an Epic. With these in mind, you can update your own exercise program, yoga practice, or martial or dance form to provide Epic challenges.

Epic Principles

I. Movement Matters: focus on the essence of multi-dimensional, multi-use movement found throughout life

II. Mindful Intensity: build intuitive skill with mindful intensity, repetition and rhythm

III. Movement as your Mirror: take our mind-body connection seriously and use movement purposefully to discover in yourself what there is to discover

When you apply these principles, you are using exercise to nourish and support your own hero’s journey.

Epic trainers are huge fans of yoga. In fact, Epic is about bringing the lessons an inspired Yoga practice offers the world to a new order of movement. In fact, conscious movement is critical for personal and collective transformation and when we get past much of the mainstream fitness marketing, we find that in order to make a real change in our body and mind, it helps when we really pay attention to what we are doing and why we are doing it. Yoga teaches about intention for movement and the skills for really noticing to our experience. In a nutshell, this means that as we learn to honor our bodies, nurture our spirits, and deepen our relationship with our self and everything we’re connected to, we help to heal the world as well as ourselves.

Yogis of all kinds see something for themselves in The Epic Workout that radically compliments their Yoga practice. Some appreciate the mindful anaerobic activity that highlights a new form of breath to focus on. Some appreciate exploring infinite variations of human movement. Others comment on the aspect of Epic that asks each participant to own their body, mind, and life through the practice. We invite you to join in their story and enhance your practice as well. As you explore, write to us and let us know how you’re doing.

Namaste.

How do you appreciate a piece of art that grabs you? What does it take?

Doesn’t it take concentration? Attention? Time? Curiosity and a certain intensity?
At the very least it takes the willingness to be there with the artwork and to explore it from many angles. When we’re with a gorgeous painting, we want to take it in as it is. The goal, you might say, is to know what’s really there.

Amazingly the process is much the same with our body. By taking the time to move and the curiosity to explore that movement with a certain intensity from the inside, the outside, from above and below, don’t you think that would transform you and how you held yourself? Don’t you think your perception of your own body, your own self, would grow by leaps and bounds?